


reiteration (a little quieter)

by ouijay



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mob, Angst, Assassins & Hitmen, Bible Quotes, Buzzfeed Unsolved True Crime, Character Death, Chases, Escape, Friends to Enemies, Gen, Gen Work, Gun Violence, Guns, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Torture, Major Character Injury, Mild Blood, Murder, Organized Crime, Panic Attacks, Rats, Serial Killer Ryan Bergara, Serial Killers, Sewers, hot daga quotes, mafia, shane and sara's relationship only shows up briefly so chill, theres one princess bride reference
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 15:28:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19379518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ouijay/pseuds/ouijay
Summary: A more pious person might have started praying when the two splashes turned into footsteps, faint and almost impossible to discern over the ambiance of the sewer, but still definitive, still solid and real.





	reiteration (a little quieter)

Water sloshed around his feet, soaking through his boots. It was cold, and full of grime. Every so often his foot would brush against something solid and he would jerk back, certain that something was going to grab him. 

 

Nothing did. 

 

He didn’t have a light, so his progress was slow. He had to rely on his ears and the feeling of the air on his face or the slimy walls of the tunnel under his finger tips. The tunnel was narrow, too, and he was tall enough that his shoulders brushed against the stone ceiling, forcing him to bend over slightly.  

 

The whole place _stank,_ too. The air was warm and rancid, like sewage or decaying meat, and it felt unsettlingly like a hot breath on his neck. He had gagged when he’d first stepped into the tunnel, and right now his shirt collar was pulled up around his face, which was pretty ineffective in terms of keeping out the offending smell. 

 

He heard splashes behind him a few times, as though something had fallen into the water. Every time, he assured himself that it was nothing more than a rat that had gotten sick of the smell and tried to end its own life. 

 

Still, though, he was paranoid enough to entertain the idea that something--or someone--had followed him--he’d barely escaped from whatever little den he’d wandered into. 

 

Who was he kidding, though, he knew he’d been where the mob hadn’t wanted him. He’d gotten cocky, rising through the ranks as fast he did, thinking he could swim against the current just because the boss had treated him like some kind of son. You wanna dance with the devil, you gotta live with it when he sets you on fire, though, and boy, was Shane living with it--He was stumbling through Satan’s cement butthole because of it! 

 

He stopped for a minute, when things (the smell, the sounds, his own fatigue) got overwhelming, leaning against the wall and wishing for a blast of cold air or a flashlight. He’d realized pretty quickly that he didn’t actually have much of a plan, since when he’d jumped into this random sewer there’d been bullets flying at his head, but he hadn’t really had any choice but to follow the tunnel and try to put as much distance between the mobsters and himself as possible. 

 

He didn’t doubt that they’d be looking for him. There were only so many places he could have gone. 

 

He wondered how it would go down--would he find some way out of this tunnel and die outside, shot down by whatever firing crew was presumably waiting for him, or had they sent someone, some lone killer, down here after him? The latter seemed more compliant with the mob’s methods--quick and quiet. He shuddered, leaning his head back against the wall, fungi and dampness be damned. He closed his eyes for a second, not that that changed much in terms of darkness, and listened, breathing in the warm, rotting air, his body pressed up against the wall while dirty water ran down around his ankles. 

 

This was no place to die, but a corpse would match the décor impeccably.

 

He listened, filtering out sounds he determined to be purely environmental: water dripping, rats running around and squeaking, the almost stream-like ambiance of the torrent at his feet. 

 

He heard nothing. 

 

It was unsettling. 

 

So he kept moving, his feet almost frozen, his clothes damp, his fingers numb as they blindly groped the tunnel, guiding him about as well as a broken traffic light at a busy intersection. Twice, he nearly tripped, almost pitching forward into the disgusting man-made swamp he was wading through. 

 

It was impossible to tell how much time had passed. He’d ducked into the tunnel sometime past midnight, he knew. He wondered if Sara would be waiting up--probably not, she’d gotten used to his busy--and secretive--schedule. She’d never complained about it, just kissed him and told him she understood, and for that, he was eternally grateful. He truly didn’t deserve her, she had a heart of gold. He didn’t deserve any forgiveness she’d offer him either, because her life was probably going to be changing very soon: he’d either be shot and killed and possibly left to rot down here, where the smell of his decaying body with compliment the already rank stench, leaving her a better-left-unsolved mystery, or he’d manage to escape this impossible situation and flee town with Sara in tow, alive but on the run forever. 

 

He knew that his death would the better of those two options, logically speaking. So long as the boss had confirmation that he was out of the picture, Sara would be fine. She’d be vaguely affiliated through ties she subconsciously knew about and chose to ignore, and if the boss really was sad to see Shane go, her protection would be guaranteed.  

 

If he lived, though… Well, the only service the boss would provide would be a priest reading their last rites. It was farcical to assume that they’d get far enough from the boss’s sphere of influence to be safe, and everyone knew the mob didn’t leave loose ends hanging. He would really prefer not to subject Sara to that kind of terror if he could help it.

 

On the other hand, though, he didn’t really want to die. In fact, all he really wanted was to settle down with Sara, get married, maybe adopt another cat, and leave all this mob shit behind him. 

 

Damn, he really was up shit creek here, with no paddle in sight. 

 

He stopped for a second--Had there been a splash behind him, or was the stink of this place finally starting to get to him? Frowning, he listened, and a few seconds later, a second splash ricocheted around the tunnel, bouncing off the curved walls. 

 

Shane froze, listening in silence, completely blind to whatever, if anything, was coming towards him. 

 

A more pious person might have started praying when the two splashes turned into footsteps, faint and almost impossible to discern over the ambiance of the sewer, but still definitive, still solid and real.

 

He didn’t, because he didn’t believe in anything, from ghouls to God. Instead, armed with all his logic and reasoning, he began frantically calculating, trying to come up with anything that could help him. Turning as silently as possible, one hand on the wall, he lifted his face and breathed in, trying to feel the air in each direction, hoping for a whiff of anything fresh or any moving air, anything that would indicate a hole he could slip into. 

 

He was disappointed. 

 

There was no way out--his heart was beating too fast, too loudly. Every instinct he had told him to run. The footsteps, sloshing through water without any care for subtlety, were getting louder, their owner’s only goal becoming more and more apparent.

 

Shane had learned what the footsteps of a killer sounded like a long time ago. They were quick yet heavy, efficient and ruthless. Even with the water dripping and running around them, he could still make them out clearly, could hear the almost-anger this man walked with. 

 

He wondered who it was--maybe Banjo, or Lim, maybe Goldsworth. He doubted it was Banjo or Lim, even though he was sure Banjo wouldn’t hesitate to crawl through this tunnel. He hoped it wasn’t Goldsworth. Goldsworth wasn’t interested ‘quick and painless.` He liked to see his victims squirm, liked to watch the fear in their eyes while they bled out, powerless to do anything while he smoked a cigar and asked them why they took so long to die. 

 

Shane had worked with Goldsworth before. It hadn’t been pretty.

 

He tried to calm himself down--no one wants to face their killer with piss running down their pant leg--and decided he had two options: step away from the wall, into the center of the tunnel, and accept his fate, or try and rush his killer. He didn’t see a high success rate for either, but it might be better to save his strength in case he survived the initial shooting and needed to drag himself out of the tunnel.

 

Moving slowly, he stepped away from the side of the tunnel and put his hands up, even though he wasn’t sure if the killer could see him. 

 

“I’m right here.” He called out, hoping he wasn’t about to be pumped full of lead. In the distance, although still too close for comfort, the footsteps stopped. 

 

“Do you really want to die?” Shane frowned, trying to place the killer’s voice--It definitely wasn’t Banjo or Lim. And while it did kind of sound like Goldsworth, he had to rule that out: Goldsworth spoke to you like the dirt he walked on was worth more than your life. This guy, though? He sounded more human, almost remorseful, like a man about to destroy a stained glass window. 

 

“I mean, no, but I’m also not going to go live out life as a fugitive.” He wondered if he was crazy, talking to this guy. The man was about to kill him in a sewer, after all. 

 

“I’m sure. Don’t worry, I’ve got a clear shot. It’ll be pretty quick. About 6 minutes until you’re completely brain dead, but you’ll be out after a few seconds.” Who was this guy? What kind of hitman said shit like that? Someone with medical knowledge… Who in the mob would have medical knowledge? Were they recruiting corrupt doctors now?

 

“So... you normally shoot your victims?” Was he stalling? He wasn’t sure, but stalling his own death seemed like a good strategy. His palms were sweating. The collar of his once pristine shirt felt too tight around his neck. 

 

“Normally I prefer quieter methods.”  

 

“Oh? Like what?” He was definitely stalling. He shifted his weight, leaning on one foot, then the other, and smiled, anxiously, even though no one could see his face. The tunnel felt like it was shrinking around him—was he on the verge of a panic attack? 

 

“Oh, you know, I’ve sampled different methods, but I usually stick to poison or sometimes smothering. Easier to clean up, you know.” The figure took a few more steps forward. Shane heard the click of a gun, and his heart skipped a beat. The tunnel was definitely getting smaller--Jesus, he was about to die. 

 

“Hey, uh, before you kill me,” He started, stopping when his tone came out as slightly hysterical. He paused, taking a deep breath—he wasn’t dead yet, even if that was subject to change. “Is Sara gonna be ok?”

 

“Who?” 

 

“Sara. My--” He stopped, wondering if he was just going to make things worse. 

 

“I asked you a question.” The killer said. Shane cleared his throat, trying to keep his voice from shaking too much.

 

“She’s my… um… my girlfriend. She’s not involved in any of this, doesn’t know anything about it. I-I don’t want her to get hurt because of me.” 

“I’ll see what I can do, Legs.” _Legs?_ Clearly, this guy knew him. He frowned, trying again to place his killer--a name appeared in the back of his brain. 

 

“Night Night?” He asked, incredulously. He’d worked with Night Night for years, the two of them often tag-teaming various targets--him, the extractor, the one who got the info they needed, and Night Night, the killer, who came to finish the job. It had been an effective strategy, until Night Night had been ‘retired’ for his zealousness. He’d been labeled a liability, and the mob didn’t like liabilities.

 

Night Night laughed bitterly, and the sound reverberated, the acoustics of the tunnel twisting it into a shallow, almost horrific noise above the rushing water. 

 

“Yeah. Been a long time.” 

 

“Hell yeah! Hey man--where’ve you been hiding out?” As much as he tried to ignore it, Shane couldn’t help feeling a little hopeful--he and Night Night had been pretty close, as far as mafia ties go. They’d even considered each other friends at one point. Maybe he could talk his way out of this one--he _was_ good at that. And Night Night had survived underground for all these years, evidently, so maybe he’d be willing to help Shane and Sara.

 

Except he wasn’t. 

 

It was the oldest trick in the book: hit ‘em when they aren’t looking. Ryan holstered his gun, glad he’d had the foresight to attach a silencer. The sewer walls seemed to trap noise, amplifying sounds to a thousand times louder than they should be, bouncing echoes back and forth between the walls until they faded into nothing.

 

“You know, here and there.” He said softly, answering Legs’ last question. He stepped forward, trudging over to the dead body, and crouched down next to it. Pulling a penlight out of his pocket, he looked at Legs’ eyes--never into them. Legs’ eyes were still open, wide with shock and surprisingly still lifelike, even as the torrent of sewer water washed his blood away beneath him. 

 

Ryan reached down and closed Legs’ eyes. 

 

“Sorry, big guy,” He said, standing up. “Time to go Night Night.” 

 

He entertained the idea of trying to carry the body out for a few seconds, but quickly abandoned the notion: Legs had a good couple of inches on him, and moving the body would only attract attention and make it difficult to slip away. Must’ve have been hell for him, though, walking down here. Ryan’s head was almost brushing the ceiling as it was. He sighed. 

 

He had stopped looking at his victims as anything other than bodies a long time ago: murder required impersonality. But he had been friends with Legs, to the extent that their careers allowed them, and he was genuinely sad to see him go. Still, better he’d been the one to pull the trigger. Better him than Goldsworth. 

 

He, at least, believed in mercy.

 

He did what he could, in terms of a funeral, leaning the body against the wall, out of the water, even if those damn long legs were still submerged, and reciting the only prayer he remembered, despite years of Catholic school. He knew Genesis 3:19 probably wouldn’t mean much to Legs, but he said it anyway, because it felt like the same impartialness he’d give a stranger. 

 

His voice shook a little at the end, and he knew that somewhere in heaven or hell, Legs was probably shaking his head and saying “Not good enough, Night, you can do better. For me, your ol’ pal Legs.” 

 

He glared at the body. “Fuck you, man.” He whispered, dropping his act for a second. “Fuck you.” 

 

And before his act disappeared altogether, he turned away from what, at the end of the day, was just another victim and away from any sense of loss, and sighed, because the world was a little quieter now. 

**Author's Note:**

> \+ if you liked this and want to support me (emotionally) follow my tumblr: https://ghoulboy-gang.tumblr.com/  
> \+ this fic is almost a year old baby! (due to months of sitting in my drafts) but i finished it tonight and decided it was time to dust her off and give her a chance in the limelight, lol i didn't edit as much as i should have so sorry for that!  
> \+ s/o to my friend angela for reading this, your compliment was lovely and i will start the dr. fear vs cc tinsley as perry the platypus and dr. doofenshmirtz tomorrow (yall got smth to look forward to 👀) and also to my friend aria for supporting this when i first derailed the original 'random guy walking through a sewer' storyline in favor of a buzzfeed unsolved mafia au, and also reacting in a gratifying way to the major character death  
> \+ if you have questions keep them to yourself. jk my tumblr ask box is open and so is the comments section :P


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